GREENEVILLE, Tenn. --- Will Samuelson went 3-for-3 with a pair of RBI as the Tusculum baseball team knocked off 30th-ranked Young Harris, 13-5 Tuesday afternoon at Pioneer Park.
The victory was also the 100th win for Tusculum head coach Brandon Steele, becoming only the third TU baseball skipper to eclipse the century-win mark in school history.
The Pioneers (8-2) extend their winning streak to eight in a row while halting the Mountain Lions (9-3) seven-game winning streak. Tusculum rattled off a dozen hits and took advantage of five errors by the visitors. Only four of Tusculum's 13 runs were earned while the Pioneers scored four times alone on YHC wild pitches.
Tusculum pitcher Jonathan Nelson (1-0) picked up the win in relief as he went 3.2 innings while allowing two runs, two hits and walked two in his 48-pitch performance.
TU's Christian Ortega went 2-for-5 with two runs scored while also hitting his second homer of the year, a two-run blast off the scoreboard in the sixth inning. For Ortega, it was his fifth multiple-hit game of the season.
Tusculum's Zane Keener had a 2-for-2 outing with a pair of walks and scored three times.
Tusculum scored six unearned runs in the first inning as the Pioneers utilized three singles, two walks and a pair as TU batted around. Murphy Flood provided the big hit of the inning with his two-run single and he scored on Samuelson's RBI single up the middle.
The Mountain got base runners aboard early but TU starter Billy Quinn worked out of several jams. He got a double play in the first and third innings. Young Harris punched through in the fourth with a pair of unearned runs as Steven Spell drove in the first score with his sacrifice fly. Jackson Kemp followed with a two-out single to drive in the second run of the frame.
Young Harris made it 6-3 in the fifth when Marco Colina led off with a walk. After a flyout by Drew Bray, Nelson took over for Quinn on the mound. Jarrett Ford hit a slow grounder in the front of the plate. Nelson scooped the ball up with his glove and tossed it towards Blake McCauley at the plate but Colina beat the throw home to make it a 6-3 game. A walk to Stamps brought the tying run to the plate. But Ortega made an outstanding catch in foul territory along the third base wall for the second out of the inning. Then Nelson got a fly out to end the inning.
Tusculum got the run back in the bottom of the fifth when Ben Scartz singled and later scored on a wild pitch. TU added two more runs in the sixth on Ortega's homer and added three runs in the seventh and one more in the eighth to put the game out of reach.
The Mountain Lions were held to just six hits on the afternoon including Ford's 2-for-4 effort.
Coach Steele joins former Pioneer baseball coaches Doug Jones (705 from 1998-2018) and Tom Griffin (184 from 1990-1997) as the only Tusculum skippers with 100 wins.
Steele becomes the fastest to get to 100 as he did it in his 174th game, while Jones accomplished the feat in 201 contests and Griffin achieved his 100th win in his 202nd game at Tusculum.
The Pioneers will open South Atlantic Conference play this weekend when they host UVA Wise for a three-game series beginning with Friday's 6 p.m. opener.
